Boy, wish I had seen this thread before. I was on UA935 on the 17th, which arrived 30 minutes early. Imagine my surprise when we were sent down the steps & onto a bus & sent to TBIT, where other flights came in at the same time.

So much for being 1A on the 777!!!

I guess I was 'semi' lucky because I was on the first bus squeezed in against the back due to everyone else getting on. I was in the 'short line' where it still took 20+ minutes to get through, and Mr. Customs was quite grumpy. What also suprised me was that, unlike T6/7, there was no separate lane for the flight crews. I had the co-pilot & an FA in my lane. The FA told me it had been this way for a while; the Co-P said it was because LHR was the only aft flight so they didn't want to keep T6/T7 open.

Then, after luggage came up I headed for what I thought was the exit which was near the carousels I was at, except to be directed back to some center carousel with a big exit sign on (which I thought was specific to that area - as did everyone else who got 're-routed'). Then after getting through that & before the 3rd person to give the form to, people from different lanes all ended up mashing & having to juggle their way through.

TBIT is such a dump. And I didn't even think of the lost luggage/mis-connect due to delays/no UA help that others mentioned, as I was terminating at LAX. What a mess. And what a loss of one of the bennies of UA at LAX.

Cheers.